Monthly Archives: August 2015

Description:
Sven Klaus, Chief Toy Designer for Klaus Enterprises, will protect his family at any cost. He’s prepared to battle the most threatening adversaries to do it–frost flowers, snowstorms, Yeti. And beautiful tenacious tabloid journalists.

Andi De Luca’s reporting career is built on lies–about corrupt politicians, greedy Hollywood stars, and Bigfoot. Now she’s determined to uncover the truth about Klaus Enterprises, and she always gets her story. Even if it means revealing her own secret desires to Santa’s son.

After all the lies and deception are exposed, will Andi and Sven survive this North Pole adventure? Or will YETI MAKE THEM DEADY?

Review:As a note, I started writing this review last year and just found it in my draft…I thought I had posted it…

I love it when I check my email in the morning and I get the notification that a book i’ve been waiting for is released – I do a total happy dance – virtual if in the car, real if I’m at home. So it made my day when I saw on twitter that Penny had released the 3rd book in the Klaus brothers series. This is a series I’ve been following for a couple of years now, ever since she released her first book. I will admit to having known Penny from the Amazon forums for several years where she is a frequent participant.

For those of us that had been reading the series, the first part of the book was well-known because it had been a teaser at the end of Sweet Magik (and i might have re-read it several times while waiting)…but Sven had me from the get go…he was the brother that we met in the first book and I immediately wanted to see him get his HEA. And I mean, seriously, a toy designer, can i please have one of those for Christmas? And Andi – well, she is kind of like that terrier who latches on and just won’t let go (which I guess is a good description of a journalist)…I will admit that I liked/related more to Sven than to Andi, who I found to be kind of annoying – but oh well…

Honestly, I will admit that since I’m looking back to a book I read last year and i’ve read about 270 books since then, my mind is a bit hazy on what I do and don’t remember (do you blame me?)…but on the bright side, Penny posted that book 4 is in progress – hehe! maybe i’ll try to squeeze a re-read of Sweet Adventure in before it releases (and the revise this review)…

Thursday Quotables is a weekly feature hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies. It is a weekly feature where readers highlight a quote or quotes from their current weeks reading. Whether it’s something funny, startling, gut-wrenching, or just really beautifully written.

Sometimes it is probably a good thing that I do most of my driving/listening to audiobooks alone – especially when I am listening to Molly Harper – because I find that I laugh at the silliest things. She has a way with her writing style, that even what could be seen as a potentially dull advice handbook (such as the quotes that appear at the start of each chapter from The Office After Dark: A Guide to Maintaining a Safe, Productive Vampire Workplace) are actually rather smart and funny. It is always hard for me to narrow down my favorite quotes to one or two – but hopefully I can.

“women are terrifying creatures who sometimes expect the men around us to read our minds.”

I’m pretty sure most men would agree with the following quote – right? I mean, there have been many books sold about how to understand women (but really, are we THAT confusing…)

“Two hundred years of work experience was a human resources nightmare.”

This quote just made me laugh because it is so true – in my day job, I work in a Human Resources-ish kind of role, so i’ve done job application screening etc and seeing some of the applications where people have documented every single thing they did (sometimes, I think, down to what they ate on a certain) – makes for some really long resumes – i can only image what 200yrs of job history would look like…lol

Of course, as with any Molly Harper – there were lots of quotes that I just didn’t manage to write down and that I can only remember parts of – enough to make me laugh – kind of like the Cajun Land Shark, when talking about a guy who has the ability to project different creatures – why a shark would be in the middle of Kentucky is a whole other story; or Cal (the vampire hero from a previous book in the series) when he makes comments like, “I get to ogle, it was in the vows” (and yes, he was talking about his wife) and finally, my favorite (and dammit, I hate that i didn’t write it down) – the night of 3 toms – tom hiddleston, tom hardy and tom collins (yes, the drink)…which by the way, if this doesn’t exist, it should…

What about you – any funny quotes from your read (or listening) this week?

Wishlist Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Pen to Paper where we post about one book that has been hanging out on our wish list (either for a long time, or not so long)

One of the things I love about this feature is the fact that many books that are featured by other bloggers, often end up on my to read list. i’m pretty sure that I came across my pick for this week from another blogger (I only wish I could remember who…) My pick this week is a new to me author (Louise O’Neill), but there is something about the description that caught my eye – as well as the barbie-doll-esque model on the cover and I’m typically a fan of realistic young-adult fiction

Description:
It’s the beginning of the summer in a small town in Ireland. Emma O’Donovan is eighteen years old, beautiful, happy, confident. One night, there’s a party. Everyone is there. All eyes are on Emma.

The next morning, she wakes on the front porch of her house. She can’t remember what happened, she doesn’t know how she got there. She doesn’t know why she’s in pain. But everyone else does.

Photographs taken at the party show, in explicit detail, what happened to Emma that night. But sometimes people don’t want to believe what is right in front of them, especially when the truth concerns the town’s heroes…

Description:
From its famous coffee to the mouthwatering fare at its cafés, restaurants, and bakeries, Portland, Oregon, has a lot to whet the appetite, including the hard-working men who serve it all up—hot, fresh, and ready to go—with no reservations…

Vic Degrassi is a baker on the rise, and it’s all thanks to his rare ability to make—and keep—his New Year’s resolutions. Whether it’s losing weight, giving up smoking, or graduating from culinary school, Vic goes after what he wants—and gets it. This year? He wants Robin Dawson, the sweet-hearted hottie who volunteers with him at the local homeless shelter.

When he learns that Robin is suddenly single after being unceremoniously dumped, Vic is more than happy to offer a shoulder to cry on—or at least a fresh-baked pastry to bite into. But it’s been a long time since Vic’s gone on a date, and he’s nervous about risking his friendship with Robin. So when their flirtation turns into a steamy night together, Vic and Robin have to figure out if they’re friends with benefits or lovers in the making, and if Robin is ready for something more than just a rebound. There’s only one way to find out: turn up the heat…

Review:**This Review Includes SPOILERS**
When I picked up Baked Fresh, it had been a while since I had read any m/m romance because I had felt myself getting burnt out on it. However, a friend proposed Baked Fresh as a group read in one of my Goodreads groups and I was sufficiently intrigued that I decided to request it via netgalley. Unfortunately, my interest based on the description and cover soon waned…I had a hard time figuring out why but ultimately, I realized, that I just couldn’t connect with any of the characters/couldn’t emphathize/sympathize with them. Added to that, my mental image of the 2 characters didn’t match with what was on the cover – specifically, one of the charaters had weight loss surgery and was described as being cuddly and that isn’t a term I would use to describe either guy on the cover.

Aside from the whole cover disconnect, I felt like Robin and Vic just didn’t talk – there were so many discussions they should have had, that never occurred. For example, Robin is an ex-drug user, but you never find out when/why he became addicted or how he kicked the addiction. Or Vic, who had had the lapband surgery, never really addressed his personal issues with Robin – he was so insecure about who he was (I guess in part due to his size/weight issues), but for me, it just wasn’t enough. I felt empty when it came to their relationship. There was also a really quick transition in the relationship between Robin/Vic that just felt empty – it went from them not dating (or not wanting to date), not dating, not dating, don’t want to have sex, to jumping each others bones – I just wanted more.

Overall, I was disappointed in Baked Fresh because I was hoping for so much more – I don’t know if its because I hadn’t read the previous book in the series that may have set the scene a bit more…Overall, I gave Baked Fresh 2 stars

Review:
When I look back at the date this book was purchased, it was right before I left Kuwait in 2009 to head home from my year long deployment. So I think I may have purchased it to read on the plane, and then (if I remember rightly), we had really crappy internet and I was unable to download it to my computer to transfer to my kindle – so it got forgotten about until recently when I dug it out to read (mostly because it fit a book challenge, as well as hearing that the series was finally being released in audiobook format – it was an often requested one, so i’m honestly curious to see how it is in audio).

It’s also been a while since I’d read any really good romantic suspense type work, so that made it an enjoyable read. I’ll also admit that I’m a fan of book series with sibings/friends who work together (although at the same time, they can be too over-done if its a huge series all about siblings…but that is a gripe for another day). I will say that in a few places, it felt kind of dated (but when, what do you expect when the book was originally released 13 years ago). The storyline was well-developed and the enemy/evil character was believable. I liked how Raine didn’t have too many TSTL moments (although there were a few) and Seth, well, he was just all around kick-ass. I’ll admit that I’m intrigued enough that I want to continue the series (hopefully in the not too distance future)…Overall, I gave Behind Closed Doors 3.5/5 and looking forward to more books in the series.

Whoops, I’m a little bit behind in getting my week 3 post up, because I had my monthly weekend military drill – so it was an insane this past weekend and when I got home last night, I literally fell into bed and slept for like 12hrs. Unfortunately, that also meant that my weekend reading was almost non-existant (boo-hoo!) and the rest of my week wasn’t much better. I managed to finish 3 books this week, and also DNF’d one (because while they were short stories, they were too short for me and didn’t really work – but it felt good to get it off the pile).

Description:
One fateful misstep for Gayla Levine was all it took for her once-adoring fiancé to walk away and her demanding father to disown her. Determined to finally turn her life around and embrace her newfound independence, she wants nothing to do with men or relationships—until she meets Dan Newman, a sexy surgeon who sends a shock of electricity through her every time they touch.

Dan Newman has spent his life struggling to overcome his own crippling past by devoting himself to healing others who have suffered. Now a world-class surgeon, he’s confident in his ability to face anything life throws at him—until he meets a headstrong Texas beauty who has his pulse racing and fills his dreams with impossibly sensual visions.

As they fall into a passionate romance that takes them both to the burning edges of pleasure, these two damaged souls must both confront their darkest demons. Because Gayla is haunted by the echoes of being called a failure and torn by the fear that she’ll be rejected once again, and Dan, who has proved his worth to so many others, now must convince himself and Gayla that they deserve the powerful love they’ve found.

Review:
This is a hard review to write, because I’ve read and enjoyed the author in the past and this book didn’t even come close to what I expect of her. However, I did finish it – although there was some heavy griping during that time…however, before I was even done, I knew I needed to do some research into the history of the book, because the netgalley description mentioned that it was a previously published book (Dallas Heat).

From the get-go, I had issues with how the cover portrayed (or didn’t portray the story) and actually the same could be said for the series title. The cover of the book (guy in a cowboy hat) with a horse and oil rigs in the background meant that I expected those things to make a significant appearance in the book – so I was disappointed to find out, that there was only one brief mention of the main characters going horseback riding and only one very minor secondary character alluded to as being involved in oil. However, when I went and looked at the previous editions, there was only one of the four (that I saw) that actually looked like it was related to the book.

Aside from that, the writing just felt really chunky and didn’t flow well. I don’t know if it was because it had been revised several times, but something just didn’t click for me. Although I have to wonder how much my opinion of the book was based on my expectation of what I was going to get, compared to what I actually did. I did think the story itself had potential and I liked Gayla/Dan – but I just couldn’t get past my perception. That being said, I have enjoyed the author in the past and will try some of her more recent stuff to see if that is maybe where my disconnect with the author’s writing was. Unfortunately, I could only give Rescuing an Angel only 1.5 stars.